Everton management want Wayne Rooney to stay next season.

Rooney has a £12.5m contract on the table from DC United.

But the Daily Mail says Everton have asked Rooney's agent, Paul Stretford, to meet them next week.

While majority shareholder Farhad Moshiri wanted to free up the cash spent on Rooney in wages — Everton pay £150,000 a week with Manchester United paying the difference on the £15m-a-year deal that has another year to run at Old Trafford — chairman Bill Kenwright is convinced that allowing Rooney to leave is a bad idea.

Indeed Kenwright has now created enough anxiety among directors to make them reconsider.

But Rooney is resigned to leaving, concluding that he has no great desire to stay when it is clear to him the board want him to play his football elsewhere.